


A Friend

by hondansadeensommar



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Car Accidents, Gen, Writing Exercise, no one is injured
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-29
Updated: 2017-10-29
Packaged: 2019-01-25 22:25:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12542580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hondansadeensommar/pseuds/hondansadeensommar
Summary: It was NOT Chen's day...





	A Friend

**Author's Note:**

> This was literally just a quick NaNoWriMo creativity booster... I was given a d20 and a page with different ideas, and had to roll for my prompt. My rolls were accountant, restaurant kitchen, car accident, and hair dryer. This is what came from it. Enjoy!

Chen sat down in the small office looking out at the restaurant’s kitchen, burying his face in his hands.  He wasn’t sure exactly how it had come to this.

Things had been going so well.  His life had been pretty much perfect up until that point - a great job, a great apartment, and a girlfriend he’d loved with all of his heart.  And yet somehow, the whole thing had been ruined in a single day.

“You know it isn’t the end of the world…” a voice commented, prompting Chen to look up from his spot as the exceptionally tall young man that had invited him in out of the rain knelt in front of him with a towel.  “It’s just a car accident… and I saw the whole thing.  You didn’t do anything wrong…”

“I appreciate the encouragement… but this is just the last straw in a series of really shitty things happening to me today,” Chen replied, taking the offered towel and pressing it against his bleeding lip.

“Is it really that bad?” the other man asked, quirking an eyebrow in a way that indicated he was indeed curious about the whole ordeal.

“When I woke up this morning, I found out that my girlfriend had moved out last night while I was at work without telling me…” Chen began.

“ _Aish_ … I’m sorry.”  The tall man stood there awkwardly, clearly unsure of what to do or say.  “Do you want something to drink or something?”

“You sure your boss won’t mind the random stranger in his kitchen?” Chen asked, although his words were slightly muffled by the cloth as he attempted to staunch the steady flow of blood from his bottom lip.

“Pretty sure the boss is more than happy to help out someone who’s day has been so shitty,” the tall man replied, smirking as he walked away to fetch the offered glass of water.  Chen wasn’t sure exactly what that was all about, but he was just glad for the man taking him in.

It had been raining all day - an appropriate setting for Chen’s current mood.  He hadn’t known that the other car was going to skid on the wet pavement, although luckily they had both managed to slow down enough that no one was injured.  Chen’s older-model car was likely totaled, according to the police officer that had shown up to deal with the situation and ticket the other driver for driving too fast for conditions.  The tall man had shown up as Chen was watching his car be loaded onto a tow truck, with an umbrella and an offer of somewhere to sit down for a bit and figure out what he was going to do next.

“Here… drink this,” the man commented, passing him a glass of water and holding out a bottle of painkillers.  “And you’ll probably want these.  I know you said you aren’t hurt, but you’re going to be in pain in a couple of hours anyway.  It’s better to start medicating before it gets bad.”

“You sound like you’re speaking from experience,” Chen replied, taking the offered items and popping back two of the pills before chasing them with the glass of water, ignoring the fact that his lip was still bleeding slightly.

“My dad was of a shitty driver,” the tall man admitted, leaning against the door jamb.  “Do you have anyone else you can call?  Or do you need to call your boss?”

“I got fired this morning,” Chen replied, shaking his head.  “I worked for her father.”

“ _Aish_ … so this has really just been the shitty day to end all shitty days, huh?” The tall man took back the bottle of painkillers as he spoke, shaking his head.  “What did you do, anyway?”

“I was an accountant for his law firm… did their payroll and sorted out all of the client accounts.”  Chen took another sip from the glass of water.  “The worst part is, I _knew_ it was a bad idea to take the job when I accepted… but I was just out of school, and it paid better than any other accounting job I’d seen offered.  Plus it was one of the best law firms in the city… how was I supposed to pass that up?”

“I wouldn’t have passed that up either, honestly…” the taller man replied.  “It sounds like the ideal scenario…”

“Until it all goes to shit because your girlfriend dumps you without any warning,” Chen replied bitterly.  He put the cloth back to his lip, realizing that the bleeding had begun to pick up again.  “Sorry about dumping all of this on you…”

“Don’t worry about it,” the tall man responded, shaking his head.  “Why don’t you come upstairs?  I can find you some dry clothes, and we can figure something out until either you can get someone to pick you up, or the rest of the staff gets here so that I can take you home.”

Chen raised an eyebrow at the suggestion.  “You live above the restaurant you work at?”

“No… I live above the restaurant I _own_ ,” the man replied, shaking his head.  Chen nodded, suddenly realizing that the tall man’s explanation certainly made a lot more sense than a random employee inviting him into the kitchen to clean up.  “I’m Chanyeol, by the way,” he replied.

“Chen.”

“Well, Chen… how about we go upstairs and find something for you to wear that _isn’t_ soaked?” Chanyeol asked, holding out a hand to help Chen up from his seat.  Chen accepted, following willingly as Chanyeol led him through the kitchen and towards the back entrance they had used to enter the building, turning left just before the door and heading through a different door with a keypad lock.  There were stairs immediately behind the door, which the two men climbed quickly, leading into a spacious open-concept loft apartment.  

It was nice, from what Chen could tell.  To his left was a brick wall full of windows that looked down onto the street below.  On the right was a small, well-equipped kitchen tucked into an alcove filled with stainless steel appliances and a small dining set.  Two other doors left the main space, into what Chen assumed would be a bedroom and a bathroom, and the far wall was again filled with windows.  The rest of the main space was apparently a living area, although Chen could see a piano and a guitar in front of the windows against the far wall.

“Nice place,” Chen commented, following Chanyeol as he headed towards the door closest to the kitchen.

“Thanks.  My mom thinks I should move into something a bit nicer, but I like it,” Chanyeol replied, leading Chen into a bedroom.  “I don’t think any of my clothes are really going to fit you that well, but at least you won’t be at risk of catching pneumonia while we’re waiting for people to get here.”

“No one else has a key for your restaurant?” Chen asked.

“Manager’s on vacation.  I like the assistant manager, Kai, but he hasn’t been in the position long enough to be completely on his own yet, so I’m playing manager for the week and just keeping an eye on things,” Chanyeol replied.  “It was… kind of a messy situation, honestly.  Last manager left unexpectedly, and I had to promote Minseok to manager before we really had anyone ready to take his place as assistant.  Kai was the best candidate I had, but he doesn’t have the management experience yet to run this place without someone around as backup.”

“And you let your manager go on vacation when all of this was happening?” Chen asked, as Chanyeol pulled out a black sweater and a pair of jeans that Chen knew would make him look like a small child wearing his older brother’s clothes.

“Minseok asked off months ago… it’s his sister’s wedding, and as his friend I couldn’t let him miss out on something like that,” Chanyeol replied, shrugging.  “Besides, I’m here.  And I actually sort of miss being involved in day-to-day operations of the place, so it’s nice to get a chance to take over again for a bit.”

Chen nodded, watching as Chanyeol moved into the bathroom and set the clothes down on the counter top.  “There are towels under the sink, and I think there’s a hair dryer down there, too.  Feel free to help yourself.”

“Thanks,” Chen replied, watching as Chanyeol left the room to give him some privacy.

It took much longer than expected to get out of his soaked work suit and into the dry clothes, especially once it came time to actually try and make his hair look like he _hadn’t_ been turned into a soaked rat by the rain.  The hair dryer helped somewhat, but there was only so much Chen could do to make himself look presentable without a comb or brush and he certainly wasn’t comfortable with the idea of borrowing something like that from someone who was essentially a total stranger.

Finally, Chen found himself walking out of the bedroom and towards the kitchen with his used towel in hand.  “I didn’t know where to put this…” he commented, as Chanyeol turned to look at him.  

The man smiled, reaching out to take it from him.  “I’ll take it.  I normally just do my own laundry in the restaurant’s machines… saves a little money to not have to own two sets of machines,” Chanyeol replied.  He threw the damp towel over his shoulder, before returning to the kitchen.  “What did you do with your wet clothes?”

“I have them over the shower curtain rod to dry…” Chen began.

“If any of it can go in a dryer, I can throw it in for a little bit while we wait… I don’t use it much for clothes, but this is a situation where I think it’s called for.”

Chen nodded slowly and started to go back into the bathroom, before stopping and turning back around.  “Why are you being so nice to me, Chanyeol- _ssi_?” Chen asked, pushing up the oversized sleeves of Chanyeol’s sweater so that they wouldn’t completely cover his hands.  “I mean, I’m a total stranger… for all that you know, I could be a serial killer…”

“ _I_ could be a serial killer,” Chanyeol replied, shrugging slightly.  “It looked like you could use a friend.  And something just told me that I shouldn’t ignore that… that I should do something about it.”

“Thank you, Chanyeol- _ssi_.”


End file.
